Cogan's Trade

George V. Higgins

Orion, Sep 6, 2012 - Fiction - 224 pages

A crime masterpiece brought back into print - and transformed into the major film, Killing Them Softly, starring Brad Pitt.

'Brilliant' WASHINGTON POST 'Gripping' TIMES 'Masterly' WALL STREET JOURNAL

Jackie Cogan doesn't advertise what he does. But when the New England mob have a mess they need cleared up, they know who to call. Markie Trattman runs a high-stakes card-game under their protection. When the game gets raided by a couple of no-name hoodlums, Jackie's out of pocket. Unless of course he set up the heist himself. Either way the mob's got a problem. To restore credibility and keep things running smooth, they need to find out who's behind the heist - and then justice must be seen to be done. Which is where Jackie comes in. The trouble is, this is one game with a lot of players, including an out-of-town hitman, a sleazy attorney, a professional dog-stealer, and enough hoods, hangers-on and high-rollers to really make Jackie earn his dough.

Filmed as Killing Them Softly.

What people are saying

LibraryThing Review

User Review  - datrappert - LibraryThing

Like his classic THE FRIENDS OF EDDIE COYLE, perhaps 90% of this book consists of dialogue. There is no back story. Everything the reader knows is revealed through the characters’ conversations. But ...

LibraryThing Review

User Review  - SanctiSpiritus - LibraryThing

Mario Puzo gives us eloquent and artistic proses when unfolding a story of the Mafia, and underworld. George V. Higgins gives you the grit, the hard-boiled inner-workings of low on the totem pole true ...

About the author

George V. Higgins was a lawyer in the Massachusetts Attorney General's office, in the Organized Crime section and the Criminal Division, and an Assistant United States Attorney, in Boston. He then founded his own private practice, defending Watergate conspirator G. Gordon Liddy and Black Panther Eldridge Cleaver. Described as 'the Balzac of the Boston underworld', he wrote more than twenty novels, including a number of lowlife masterpieces constructed almost entirely out of pitch-perfect dialogue. He died in 1999. Cogan's Trade is the book behind the major motion picture Killing Them Softly starring Brad Pitt.

Bibliographic information

• Title: Cogan's Trade
• Author: George V. Higgins
• Publisher: Orion, 2012
• ISBN: 1409137589, 9781409137580
• Length: 224 pages
• Subjects: Fiction / Crime; Fiction / Mystery & Detective / General; Fiction / Mystery & Detective / Hard-Boiled; Fiction / Noir; Fiction / Thrillers / Crime; Fiction / Thrillers / Suspense; Social Science / Criminology